California Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom has decided to remove hundreds of National Guard troops from the border. The National Guard has until the end of March to finish the removal.

Newsom just gave President Donald Trump an excuse to invoke the National Emergencies Act. From Fox News:

Newsom’s plan will require the National Guard to immediately begin withdrawing troops but still give it until the end of March to do so. According to excerpts from his Tuesday State of the State address, he will call the “border emergency” a “manufactured crisis,” and will say that “California will not be part of this political theater.”

Newsom’s order will require around 110 National Guard troops to help the state prepare for its next wildfire season while another 100 members will be deployed to focus specifically on combating transnational crime, according to excerpts from his speech. A spokesman for Newsom said his office will separately request federal funds for the expansion of the state’s counterdrug task force program, The Los Angeles Times reported.

Over 2,000 National Guard troops are on the border along with 2,300 active-duty troops. Trump wants to send 3,750 more troops to the border “to help install wire barriers and monitor border crossings.” From The Sacramento Bee:

In his State of the Union speech earlier this month, Trump blamed illegal immigration for straining the country’s economy and resources. Trump also said it has increased crime, despite evidence that immigrants commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans.

The Pentagon last week announced that it would send 3,750 troops to the border in coming months, where they are expected to install 150 miles of concertina wire and aid Customs and Border Protection, according to the Pentagon.

“The lawless state of our southern border is a threat to the safety, security, and financial well being of all Americans,” Trump said. “We have a moral duty to create an immigration system that protects the lives and jobs of our citizens.”

The decision comes days ahead of another possible government shutdown over border wall funding. Trump has threatened numerous times he will declare a national emergency if he doesn’t receive the money to build a wall.

It also comes a week after New Mexico Democrat Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham chose to remove the majority of the state’s troops from the border. Like Newson, she doesn’t believe Trump’s declaration that there is a national security crisis at the border.

I keep wondering if the proper solution is to build walls and send Nat Guard where they are welcome. Let those bordering land owners and state governors prove there is no emergency or no harm in having people swarm through their open borders.

in true national emergencies . . . the President could and did federalize the National Guard.

Until he does, state forces really don’t have much business being involved in national border control. The national borders are a federal responsibility, and should be controlled by federal policy and federal forces.

The National Guard is, as the name implies, a federal force, not a state force. In normal times federal law delegates command to the state governors, since they generally have more use for it than the president does; but whenever the president decides he needs a unit he can take command. For instance NG units are routinely sent overseas when needed.

Well, that’s not quite right. It is in fact both a state and federal force, and the members take a dual oath. Of course the Federal part is superior, and NG personnel may be called for overseas duty. See Perpich v. DOD, 496 US 334 (1990) for an extensive treatment of the issue.

Since 1933, federal law has provided that persons enlisting in a state National Guard unit simultaneously enlist in the National Guard of the United States, a part of the Army. The enlistees retain their status as state Guard members unless and until ordered to active federal duty, and revert to state status upon being relieved from federal service.

When there is no national emergency state governors have the power to raise certain very limited objections to such orders; the case was about a challenge to those limits, and it was rejected by a unanimous court. In a declared national emergency they lose that power altogether. Another reason for Trump to declare an emergency over the border crisis.

As a California resident, I suggest that all illegals captured by ICE and the border patrol be sent to that wonderful liberal state of Hawaii. They really deserve it more than we do, and since my kids and grandkids live in California, I would appreciate them not sending them here. Oh, PDJT, tear down that wall on the CA border and put it where people want it.

Trump blamed illegal immigration for straining the country’s economy and resources. Trump also said it has increased crime, despite evidence that immigrants commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans.

The nonstop lying is getting depressing. Here (as usual), SacBee conflates “immigrants” and “illegals” to pretend that the President is fantasizing. Immigrants—the legal ones, who do things the official and legal way—are no more likely to be criminals than am I. And I’m a very uninteresting person so far as law enforcement is concerned. The typical American is far more criminally inclined. And the typical “undocumented immigrant” is already engaged in crime without even doing anything more ambitious than sneaking in, and maybe buying a fake SS number.

I don’t know what status those National Guard on are, it if it’s Title 10 active duty, they don’t belong to Newsom anymore. They’re Trumps. If they’re Title 32 or state active duty, I guess it’s the governor’s prerogative. Still all a political stunt either way.

As for sending the military to lay concertina wire—quit dilly dicking around. Send in the engineers; the Seabees, RED HORSE and combat engineers. Start building the damn wall and dare Pelosi to come down and physically stop them.